During a speech earlier this month celebrating her team’s World Cup victory, Megan Rapinoe ended with a plea to fans. “We have to be better,” she said, urging all of them to consider how they could effect change in their communities. “It’s our responsibility to make this world a better place.”
Now, Ms. Rapinoe, a captain of the United States women’s soccer team, will transfer that message into a book. The untitled project, acquired by Penguin Press and expected to be out in fall 2020, will include anecdotes from Ms. Rapinoe’s life, said the Penguin Press president and editor in chief Ann Godoff, who made the deal, but its message will go beyond sports.
“A lot of women, great women soccer players, have written memoirs,” Ms. Godoff said. “Megan has a different platform.” While watching the World Cup, she said, “I thought, ‘Here’s a woman who is comfortable in her own skin,’” and noted her own children’s excitement about Ms. Rapinoe’s authenticity.
“She’s just operating from this very honest and straightforward and ‘This is who I am’ place,” Ms. Godoff said. “I think that’s what many people aspire to.”
In an email, Ms. Rapinoe said she is excited to share her story with readers. “I hope this book will inspire people to find what they can do, and in turn inspire other people around them to do the same,” she said.
Ms. Rapinoe has spoken out on social justice issues and politics, particularly L.G.B.T.Q. rights and pay equity for women. These issues will also be addressed in the book, Ms. Godoff said.
“Coming from that very honest and authentic place and being able to find a way to put that on the page,” she said, “I think will make a very lasting book.” Ms. Godoff declined to say how much the publisher is paying Ms. Rapinoe.
The soccer star has also signed on to do a middle-grade book with Razorbill, a division of Penguin Young Readers, which will address “the power young people have within their own communities and the world at large,” according to a statement. Her overall message, she said, is that “we can change the world in one generation, and have one hell of a time doing it.”
Source : NYtimes
